This was mentioned in a recent comment, but it is worth highlighting more visibly. Andy Waterhouse from the Department of Viticulture and Enology, and Charlie Bamforth, Anheuser-Busch Professor of Malting and Brewing Sciences, both at UC Davis, debate wine vs beer. Sounds like a win-win to me.
Recommendations of the Underutilized Plants Symposium
This just in from Hannah Jaenicke, Director of the International Centre for Underutilized Crops (ICUC):
Over 200 delegates from 55 countries gathered in Arusha, Tanzania 3-7 March 2008 for an International Symposium on “Underutilized plant species for food, nutrition, income and sustainable development”. The Symposium was co-convened under the umbrella of the International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS) by the International Centre for Underutilised Crops (ICUC) with the Global Facilitation Unit for Underutilized Species, Bioversity International, GlobalHort, Plant Resources of Tropical Africa, and the World Vegetable Center, whose Regional Center for Africa was the local host.
The symposium was a resounding approval of the need for a working group on underutilized plant species to provide a voice to those who are working on these plants. The delegates endorsed the International Society for Horticultural Sciences’ working group on underutilized plants, which is co-chaired by Dr Hannah Jaenicke of the International Centre for Underutilised Crops (ICUC) and Dr Irmgard Hoeschle-Zeledon of the Global Facilitation Unit for Underutilized Species (GFU), and filled it with life and suggestions for future collaboration on research and development projects. A report will be published and circulated in the near future.
Following three days of over 150 scientific presentations, the participants developed a series of recommendations around four pertinent issues.
Continue reading “Recommendations of the Underutilized Plants Symposium”
Nibbles: Carnival, farmer schools, zero-till, drought, barley, ag college, organic choc, ICTs
- Tangled Bank 101.
- From ELDIS 1: Farmers in Malawi learn best from one another.
- From ELDIS 2: Improving crop-livestock systems in Ethiopia.
- Nature and Science on the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD).
- Barley makes a come-back? No, it’s not beer-related, Jeremy.
- A call for respect for Nagpur’s agricultural college in its centenary year. Seconded.
- Internets buzzing this morning. Check out a NatGeo video on how organic cacao is saving the rainforest in the Dominican Republic.
- CTA wants one laptop per farmer. Not just to “make better PowerPoints,” though.
Nibbles: Bees, weird food, wagyu cattle, medieval agriculture, beer
- India to research bees in detail.
- Yak knob to go with your yak milk, sir?
- George Lucas does his bit to conserve a weird cattle breed, the Japanese wagyu. Well, kinda.
- Was the typical English village founded around 900 AD as a result of monastically-driven agricultural innovation?
- Diverse healthy reasons to drink beer; Luigi unavailable for comment.
Nibbles: AGRA, Andean potatoes, farmer factsheets, tequila, Dogon, yak milk
- AGRA’s first eight PhD students get to work.
- Papa Andina Regional Initiative assessed by CGIAR CAPrI. Can’t be bothered reading the whole thing? Try this.
- Factsheets for farmers in Kenya and Uganda; Luigi’s MIL not available for comment.
- Tequila for lunch: Jeremy comments: “Wish I could be at this seminar, at the University of California, Davis”.
- Dogon agriculture 101.
- Got yak milk?